Lindsay Lohan's prison sentence is an outrage

Is this the global reputation you want, Los Angeles? Is this, in all sooth, the way in which you wish the world to perceive your city – as a place where rich white girls go to jail?

Following this week's miscarriage of Lindsay Lohan-related justice, one can only assume the answer to be in the affirmative. As things stand, LA remains on high alert after another travesty of a judgment on a monied Caucasian who had repeatedly violated the terms of her DUI sentence. If this simmering tension spills over into mindless violence and pan-district rioting, then the blood will be on the legal system's hands. How many more, LA?

Even now, campaigners who marched with "JUSTICE FOR PARIS HILTON" placards are probably contemplating the horror of having to do it all again, and wondering for how long the entertainer liberation movement can maintain its tradition of peaceful resistance, or whether the time has come to move to armed struggle.

But let us begin with a recap. This week, Mean Girls star Lindsay Lohan was sentenced to 90 days in jail for repeatedly failing to attend the alcohol education programme that was a condition of her sentence for a 2007 offence. She will likely serve rather less than 25% of that time – but will do so at the very same correctional institution in which the aforementioned Hilton heiress did her stretch back in 2007. The Century Regional Detention Facility in Lynwood has yet to be explicitly designated the Robben Island of fallen partygirls – though on this form, it cannot be long before it is nicknamed "the University" by the political prisonettes who use their time behind its bars to plot a fairer society.

Not that vocal sympathy for Lindsay's troubles has been in short supply, which is as it should be, just as we should pity anyone who has had a dysfunctional childhood (presumably most of Lohan's soon-to-be fellow inmates), or who is pursued night and day by the paparazzi. Yet it would be irresponsible of us not to temper that sympathy with the facts.

The only reason Lindsay had an alcohol education programme to skive is because her expensive lawyers managed to swing it for her, in order that she might swerve jail time for a previous conviction – an offence that is considerably less easy to sympathise with. Having been arrested for a drink driving accident in 2007, it was not two months before Lindsay was apprehended again, this time having commandeered a luxury sports utility vehicle in order to engage in a high-speed, small-hours pursuit of a personal assistant who had just had the temerity to resign. Fortunately, no other road users became collateral damage in this personnel matter, or in the earlier crash, the scene of which Lindsay fled. But she had little choice but to plead guilty to cocaine use, DUI, and driving on a suspended licence, in order to ensure favourable probation terms.

And so to her reaction to this week's verdict on the repeated violation of those terms, which has certainly put her case into perspective. Indeed, Lindsay has opted to tweet several extracts from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. "It is clearly stated in Article 5 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights," she explained to followers on Wednesday, "that 'No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.'" Mm. I think they had stuff like the Final Solution in mind when they wrote that, as opposed to a court finally losing patience with a repeat offender who claimed the cocaine in the pocket of her skinny jeans belonged to someone else. But go on. "This was taken from an article," she continues, before quoting a journalist who described federal defendants in the US as "sentenced under a perverted system that saps moral judgment through its mechanical rules".

Strong words, and ones that build on Lindsay's courtroom speech (critics are calling it her finest performance since A Prairie Home Companion), which featured the immortal excuse for her no-shows: "I was working with children."

A protestation oddly redolent of Paris Hilton, who, you might recall, emerged from jail promising the establishment of "The Paris Hilton Playhouse", where sick children would come to enjoy toys and clothes donated by the celebutante and her friends. Paris also pledged to set up a "transitional home" for women leaving the prison, in order that they might break the recidivist cycle – though it may not shock you to learn that the ribbon has yet to be cut on either of those two social projects.

How Lindsay will handle Lynwood is a matter of speculation. We do know that she has previously used mandated "rest periods" as a marketing opportunity. To my knowledge, she is the only celebrity rehab patient to have participated in a photoshoot while actually inside a treatment facility's walls, having invited OK! magazine to picture her at the Cirque Lodge centre in Utah.

Clearly, the "at home" option is likely to be closed to her at Lynwood, though Paris did manage to use her phonecard to conduct an exclusive telephone interview with TV's Barbara Walters, in which she explained that being behind bars was "like living in a cage". What can you say? Other than that you'd really want to be the dirt-poor, orange jumpsuited single mother having to wait in line behind that call.